The Money Behind Palin

John McCain surprised political pundits this morning by inviting Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin to join him on the Republican ticket. Because Palin’s political career is relatively new (she was mayor of Wasilla, an Anchorage suburb, and became governor after the 2006 election), there’s little information available in the way of a campaign finance profile. That may be a positive for McCain. He has three decades of his own fundraising for the media and his political opponents to pick over, and he can contrast his running-mate with a Democratic ticket anchored by the most successful presidential fundraiser ever and another 30-year senator. Known as a reformer, Palin has also set herself apart from other Alaska politicians, if only by not being indicted or otherwise investigated for bribery and other ethical lapses. At the Center for Responsive Politics, we’ve strung together these observations about Palin’s campaign fundraising and money — and money-related scandal — in Alaska politics:

When running for governor in 2006, Palin raised a total of just $468,400 on her own in 2006 and $874,000 in combination with the lieutenant governor candidate, Sean Parnell, for a total of $1.3 million, according to FollowtheMoney.org, the website of the National Institute on Money in State Politics (NIMSP). That’s about the cost of winning a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives from an incumbent. John McCain has raised more from the oil and gas industry alone ($1.5 million) for his presidential campaign than Palin has raised statewide in her political career. But McCain didn’t bring Palin on board to win financial backers. Because he has opted into the public financing system for November’s election, he’ll receive an $84 million check from the government following the Republican convention and won’t have to worry about appealing to Americans for anything other than their votes. Until then, though, adding Palin to the ticket may stoke fundraising a bit, especially among social conservatives.

Despite being only 44 years old, Palin’s most generous financial supporters have been retirees, who gave her and Parnell $96,400 in 2006, according to NIMSP. Retirees are also the top givers, by far, to McCain, who turns 72 today. Retired individuals have given him $23.4 million compared to Obama’s $20.6 million. Palin is younger than the 47-year-old Obama, whom Republicans have said is not sufficiently experienced to lead the country. Civil servants and public officials in Alaska also got behind Palin as their executive leader, giving her and Parnell $69,600.

About 90 percent of contributions to the Palin/Parnell came from individuals, as opposed to PACs, which will help to emphasize her strength as a Washington outsider who’s not tied to corporate interests. McCain has been particularly outspoken about the influence of special interests on Capitol Hill during his congressional career, even spearheading sweeping campaign finance legislation implemented in 2004.

Palin’s addition to the McCain ticket amps up the national spotlight on corruption in Alaska politics but also on her role in reforming the way business gets done in the state. In the Veco corruption scandal, involving bribery and other influence-peddling by an oil services company, several members of the state legislature have been convicted, and one of Alaska’s senators, Ted Stevens, has been indicted for failing to report more than $250,000 in home repairs and gifts from Veco. Despite the cloud over him, Stevens won his Republican primary last week. Also tied to the Veco scandal, Alaska’s lone House member, Don Young, is under investigation, as well, for improperly inserting an earmark into a spending bill to benefit a Florida company whose employees had contributed to his campaign. Young is awaiting official results from his too-close-to-call primary contest with Alaska’s lieutenant governor, Sean Parnell, whom Palin endorsed.

The top presidential fundraiser in Alaska has not been John McCain; it’s been Barack Obama. Obama has collected about $218,000 to McCain’s $140,000. Still, Alaska is a Republican-leaning state, both in money and in votes. Fifty-eight percent of Alaskans’ money in the 2008 cycle has gone to Republicans. While soundly in the Republican column, Alaska donors have turned significantly more Democratic in this election. In 2006, 71 percent of their money went to Republicans, the GOP collected 59 percent of the cash in 2004 and 86 percent in 2000.

Picking Palin may juice McCain’s last-minute fundraising as he prepares to switch over to public financing after the convention, but McCain’s fundraisers shouldn’t expect much to come out of Alaska. Among the 50 states and the District of Columbia, Alaska ranks 50th in total contributions to federal politics, just above North Dakota. In the 2008 cycle, the state has produced just $2.6 million for candidates, parties and PACs. (California, the top state, has produced $209 million.)

As governor of a major oil-producing state, Palin supports more drilling, both offshore and on. Like other Alaska politicians, she has close ties to the oil industry. Her husband has worked in production on the North Slope for BP, in fact. Democrats have repeatedly tied McCain to the oil and gas industry, calling him “Exxon John” and citing his financial support from the industry. Will the opposition try to cast his running-mate as “B-Palin”? Through July, McCain had collected more than $1.5 million from oil and gas interests for his presidential campaign, more than three times what Obama has collected from the most unpopular industry of this election–a fact the Democrats have pointed out repeatedly. They’ll have a hard time painting Palin as bought-off by the oil industry, however. While it’s one of her top-giving industries, she has collected just $12,850 from oil and gas interests for her state campaigns, according to FollowtheMoney.org.

Republicans who feared that McCain would pick a vice presidential candidate who wouldn’t be able to win over the conservative base should have no fear now: Palin is both pro-gun rights and anti-abortion. She’s a bona fide member of the National Rifle Association, which will likely win McCain some support from a group he lost favor with after supporting the requirement that gun shows implement background checks and spearheading campaign finance legislation. As one of the most active and powerful political players, the NRA doesn’t want to see its access to Capitol Hill restricted in any way and more stringent campaign finance rules did just that. McCain has received nearly $28,000 from gun rights groups, $20,800 of which has come from the NRA. He’s also collected $2,575 from anti-abortion groups, which isn’t much given that the number one recipient, former Sen. Rick Santorum (R-Pa.) brought in $86,000. Despite running for president, McCain hasn’t collected any money from anti-abortion groups this cycle.

Except for the Revolving Door section, content on this site is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License by OpenSecrets.org. To request permission for commercial use, please contact us.